


my first kiss went a little like this

by Vellev



Series: first things first [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Awkward Crush, Crush at First Sight, F/M, First Crush, First Heartbreak, First Kiss, First Love, Kindergarden, Kissing, Little Kids Showing their Love for Each other By Making Each Others Life a Living Hell, Sexism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-03
Packaged: 2018-03-04 23:06:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3095921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vellev/pseuds/Vellev
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>First crush, first love, first kiss, first heartbreak. Shared with Jade Harley, age five.<br/>Oh, yeah. And first bitchslap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Jade Harley Affair, Part I

**Author's Note:**

> First part of a series. Yaaay. This was weird to write, but it’s even weirder to write Dave not cursing, like wow.  
> I’m tagging everything I possibly can tag, but yeah, they’re like five. Dave thinks in sexist ways because society. Wow.  
> I’m not gonna say this scene is based off real events, but this scene is based off real events.

Your name is Dave Strider, and a goddess just stole the yellow plastic steamroller from your very hands. You had just been playing with it, kneeling over with it on the sandbox and making it flatten out the ripples and clumps of uneven sand. The way that it looked when it was entirely flat comforted you in ways you didn’t really understand.

And she was the one that came in, the green and black of her dress plunging into your perfect sand, knees doubling down and crunching into it, sending every perfectly arranged and packed particle into a state of chaotic disarray. You loved it.

“Wow, I’ve never seen this kind of truck before!” She exclaims, and her voice is too loud, and it’s funny. It’s just really funny, something about the way she pronounces her words is like nothing you’ve ever heard before except in movies, and it makes a little smile come to your face, lips curling back to expose a gapped smile. 

“It’s a steamroller.” You say, trying to sound casual, your voice not coming out right no matter what you do. You didn’t see her in class all of last week, not even on the first day of kindergarten. It’s amazing how you didn’t, she’s amazing, has got this long hair and it’s so perfectly extremely straight, and not all straightened like cousin Roses’ is. “It flattens out tar and gravel and cement on roads and stuff so they’re not bumpy when you drive on them.” 

“My grandpa drove me on a bumpy road once. It was fun. I wish all roads were bumpy!” The goddess above him says, the ends of her dress brushing against the sand as she tries to figure out how the roller works. She’s not wearing tights underneath her dress, and you don’t think you’ve ever seen another kid like you that was a girl not wear tights with a skirt or a dress.

“Where are your tights?” You ask her, like it’s the most obvious question in the world.

“What?” She says, and you can’t tell if she didn’t get what you said or just didn’t hear you.

So when you speak again, it’s even louder.

“Why aren’t you wearing any tights? All the girls here wear tights, or leggings under their dresses.”

“Ms. Annabell isn’t wearing any tights.” She points out at you, and instead of using the steam roller side to flatten down the surface of the sand, she drives it upside down and just tears the sand up and makes it go everywhere. It’s sacrilege.

“Yeah, but she’s an adult.” You say, slightly wistfully as you look at the sand fly up into the air and fall back down to meet its other sand friends. A couple grains get on her dress, and it makes you a little sad, but she doesn’t seem to care. 

“Why’re you wearing those funny glasses?” She asks you, and you look up at her. She’s wearing glasses too, big ones, bigger than her eyes and circley. Her eyes are a fantastic shade of green, like the jewels in the books that Bro reads to you when you fall asleep. 

“Cause I like them. Duh.” You say.

“Yeah, but why do they look like that? They’re weird.” She says, and drops your steamroller into the sand, instead crossing her arms. You think that she’s taller than you.

“They’re cool.” You say, but your voice is a little lower, a little sadder than usual. Ms. Annabell says you’re shy, but you just think that you haven’t got much to say.

“I think that they’re really stupid.”

They’re _not_ stupid, though. They’re your shades, just like Bro’s. Yeah, they’re pointy, but they’re cool. You just cannot comprehend that they could be anything else but cool. You delve some sand into your fingertips, letting it fall through. 

“They’re not stupid.” Your voice is really small, now, and you really hope you don’t start crying. Bro is disappointed in you when you cry.

“What’s your name?” She asks you. 

“Dave Danger Strider.” You tell her, and you’re so used to saying it that you sound more confident than you actually are.

“I’m Jade Harley. I only came this week ‘cause I was in Australia before this with my grandpa.”

“Australia? What’s that?” You ask Jade, and she rolls her eyes like you’re stupid for not already knowing. You don’t like it when people roll their eyes, it’s creepy and it looks like it hurts and you really just don’t like seeing people do anything with their eyes. You wish everyone always wore shades like you and Bro, so you would never have to see their eyes or see them looking at you.

Her eyes are amazingly green, though, and you don’t think you mind seeing them. 

“It’s... It’s really far away, that’s what it is.” She says. 

“Is that why your voice sounds funny?” You ask her, being as nice as you possibly can. You’re only curious. Bro says being curious is a bad thing, that it’ll only make you get hurt, and it’s best in the long run if you just accept things the way they are. That is, until you figure out what’s good to ask people and what’s bad to ask people.  
Maybe that’s why she kicks you.

She kicks you in the sandbox, and sand goes flying everywhere. It gets all over your shirt and gets onto the jeans that Bro got you. It doesn’t get into your eyes because of your shades and you really really hope that it doesn’t get into your hair. It’s impossible to get stuff out of your hair, but maybe since your hair is black like your skin, it’ll be easy to pick it out.

And that’s when you start crying, quietly and behind your shades. You leave the steamroller there when you get up and curl around your nap time pillow, letting tears fall down onto your stupid pointy shades.


	2. The Jade Harley Affair, Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ye

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry, i'm still trying to figure out some formatting, so stuff will just be in bold until i change to homestuck skin. it won't make too much of a different, but ye.

You’ve always thought of yourself as a pretty nice person. Like, you’re shy and you’re super cool and totally not a dweeb, but you’re not really mean, not when you don’t need to be. You don’t dislike anyone without reason, even if that reason is just because they smell funny or they don’t make you feel smart. 

Which is why your deep and utter hatred of Jade Harley is so striking.

She is almost too annoying. She’s got this stupid, stupid smile that’s always plastered on her face, and sometimes you’d really like to slap it right off. They say you’re not supposed to hit girls, though, because that’s rude and they’re delicate and stuff. Bro says you’re not supposed to hit anyone, but you’ve seen him come home with a black eye before, and you don’t know if he’s really one to talk about the subject.

She is not delicate or stuff, though. She’s mean, and she always sings and makes loud noises in your face ever when you tell her not to. She likes to give you hugs and pick you up when she does it, which you like because she’s taller than you are, even if you are the boy. She doesn’t know the meaning of keep your hands to yourself, though, not at all. Once she painted your nails while you were sleeping during naptime, and you cried the entire time she was in time out. Still, the next day you came in with your nails a fancy and gorgeous red, after having had a long talk with Bro about how ironically baller nail polish was.

You don’t think you can get through a day, or even two days with her. Not when she’s like this. Eugh, she’s so girly, in the way that makes you want to stick out your tongue and gag, but then she’s tougher than you at the same time, even if she is wearing a dress. It makes you mad, really mad.

You’re better at art than her, though, which is good. The girls are normally better than the boys at crafts, so you’re pretty flat out pleased with yourself when the differing artistic masterpieces look much better and more thought out than hers.  
Of course you always draw over whatever she draws, so that’s kind of hard to estimate.  
Anyway, you’re a fantastic artist and she pales in comparison.

Both of you guys spend a majority of your kindergarten year in the time out chair. Each jab you make at each other has its consequences, which the prospect of in general disappoints you, and normally those consequences involve one, or both of you often, having to have alone time. Thinking time. No matter how much you tell your teacher that none of this was your fault, that she was the one that started it, even if you do need to go back to that first instance where she got sand in your hair, Ms. Annabell never believes you and always puts you in time out. You really really hate it there.

It’s the third to last day of school, though, and you’re having your end of kindergarten party. You've learned how to count to fifty, all the letters of the alphabet, what a conjunction is, that plants use the sun and water to grow, and that red is far by your favorite color. 

All of the parents are here. Even if the parents are the one’s that are supposed to go, Bro’s there anyway, looking too big for the kiddie chair he’s managed to fit himself in, stabbing at a piece of cheese on a small paper plate with a toothpick. You’re sitting at his feet, talking eagerly to a guy named Sam when Jade pokes you in the back. Your face automatically turns sour, and you don’t even need to look behind you to know who it was. Her hands are always so warm and sticky, with what, you don’t want to know. 

She sticks out a cookie in front of your face. “Here, my mom is making me hand these out to everyone, so I guess I made one for you too.” You look up at her, expression still pulled tight in a grimace. 

You take the cookie out of her hands, and it’s got your name on it 'dave', but her handwriting is a kid’s handwriting, so the 'e' doesn’t really fit on the cookie. There’s a heart on it. It doesn’t warm your heart. “Why’s there a heart on it? That’s so girly, Harley.”

Her face flushes, but she still looks down at you from where she’s standing up. “No it’s not!”

You feel your brother rearrange the way his feet are so he taps you lightly with his foot on your back. “Don’t be mean, Dave, the nice girl only gave you a cookie. You should thank her.”

“I’m not gonna thank her!” You say, voice high and absolutely nothing but objecting. You wouldn’t stand it, so much that all the emotion you were leaking right now could lead to some serious power plant shortages or something like that.

“Now, Dave, thank the nice girl for the cookie.” He repeats again, and Jade looks so smug about it. 

“Brooooooooo.” You complain, but it’s lost fight. Bro’s seen everything today, with you making a backrest out of his leg. “Fine. That was real swell and hunky dory of you, Jade. I could never been grateful enough, honestly, there’s no way I think I could thank you enough, not a single way.”

Bro nudges your back again with his foot, but harder this time. A kick, you guess.

“How about with a kiss?” Jade says, her voice a little quiet, but still with that same toothy smile plastered onto her face like always. It’s a nice smile, with little dips where her cheeks are when she does it, and she’s got this rosy flush to her skin, which is only a couple shades lighter than yours. It makes you angry, because you like those little dips and you wish you had them, but honestly they probably look better on her. Most anything she wears is better on her, and everything she does. She just does everything so well, and she can already read a book or two, kids books of course, but it’s so impressive, and it’s the end of the year and you still can’t quite write the letter 'e' right.

She sticks her hand out, offering it to you where you’re sitting below her, and you hear Bro laughing from where he is above her. You wish he would tell her she’s being mean and do all that cool stuff that he normally does with you. Other than his laughter, he stays completely silent and still, though.

You don’t want to kiss her hand. She’s obviously making fun of you, being mean to you, and she obviously knows that you like her, and you don’t like being lower than her, her making you kiss her hand like she’s some kind of princess and you’re some kneeling knight. 

You are, though. That’s exactly what you are, except she’s not a princess, she’s a celestial being, an angel, and you’re barely even a peasant. 

She’s wearing green nail polish, and it’s chipped like anything, but you can just make out green doggie paws drawn onto the surface. It’s awesome.

Before you know it, you’re standing up, and even when you’re standing you’re a little shorter than her. One of your hands is going up to her face, though, just like in the movies that you watch with your brother late at night on the weekends, and you press your face against hers. It hurts because she’s got these big beaver teeth, but the lips that are in front of them are so soft and it’s kind of mesmerizing.

You hear Bro laugh harder.

You never knew a kiss would feel like this. That it would hurt a little but everyone’s lips would be so soft and you could taste a little bit of orange juice and a little bit of cookie and that you would have to stand up on your toes a little to reach up to her but it would all be worth it because you felt so grown up kissing her like that, just like adults and teenagers do.

Then, her hands go right against your shoulders, and you can hear the cookie falling onto the kindergarten carpet with a crumble below you. She pushes you away, and then, lightening fast, like as fast as Bro, you feel her slap you right across the face, and actually mean it, and it stings and hurts all over the place.

She goes running back over to a group of three other girls, and you can hear them all talking and giggling and saying things about you. She doesn’t look that angry, more just a little out of place, but.

You can’t really see much more because tears are building up in your eyes and clouding your vision and she actually slapped you, she actually hit you. That wasn’t allowed, girls weren’t supposed to do that. People weren’t supposed to do that.

You just only hear Bro managing to laugh even harder at it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so, this is first things first. yay. i hope you enjoyed that chapter, because i sure didn’t enjoy writing it as much as i thought i would.
> 
> about this series—each work talks about different issues in different ways, and there is a plethora of different ratings. though meant to be read altogether, i think each would make sense alone. probably. maybe there are exceptions to that? I dunno.
> 
> check the blog, 'davefic.tumblr.com', or the author’s (my!) written works on ao3 to read them in order and for different updates on the series. i will throw in works out of order, different bonus stuff and other things like that. also feel free to ask us any questions about headcanons, firsts, or just tell us what you want about the series. thank.  
> you can ask either of the mods on that blog questions, or ask directly to my blog, ‘nicelegsdaisypukes.tumblr.com’. or, you can go to rookie’s blog which is currently at ‘yungtravolta.tumblr.com’ ‘cause they just love to talk my fix over with me and stuff and have helped me think through and write a bunch of it, so special thanks to them.

**Author's Note:**

> so, this is first things first. yay. i hope you enjoyed that chapter, because i sure didn’t enjoy writing it as much as i thought i would. 
> 
> about this series—each work talks about different issues in different ways, and there is a plethora of different ratings. though meant to be read altogether, i think each would make sense alone. probably. maybe there are exceptions to that? I dunno. 
> 
> check the blog, 'davefic.tumblr.com', or the author’s (my!) written works on ao3 to read them in order and for different updates on the series. i will throw in works out of order, different bonus stuff and other things like that. also feel free to ask us any questions about headcanons, firsts, or just tell us what you want about the series. thank.  
> you can ask either of the mods on that blog questions, or ask directly to my blog, ‘nicelegsdaisypukes.tumblr.com’. or, you can go to rookie’s blog which is currently at ‘yungtravolta.tumblr.com’ ‘cause they just love to talk my fix over with me and stuff and have helped me think through and write a bunch of it, so special thanks to them.


End file.
